The Great Hall was bustling with pre-Halloween Ball activity. Mrs. Norris crouched in a corner, safe from the heavy human feet that tramped around her, and watched spell after spell being cast to install decorations. Her paws twitched with the urge to pounce on the dangling end of a strip of ribbon before it drifted ceilingward.
At the end of the Hall where the faculty table normally stood, a series of simulated animals – bats and black cats – rose into the air. What was so special about black cats? she wondered. She had never found them to be particularly intelligent or gifted at hunting. Certainly not more than herself.
House elves appeared, bearing trays of refreshments and bowls of liquids large enough for her to drown in. She had learned from experience, and one unfortunate incident of throwing up into the shoes of someone who had abandoned them, to refrain from indulging in what was set out for the human contingent, no matter how appealing it might smell. With an internal shrug, the gray cat turned and trotted out of the Hall, removing herself from the source of so many temptations.
Only to run into new ones, in the form of students already in costume. Mrs. Norris held out for scant seconds before slashing with razor-sharp claws at a passing filmy skirt. The sound of tearing did her heart good, as did the cry of distress from the girl wearing the garment. The cat dashed off before the human's foot could reach her.
A short distance farther along, Mrs. Norris crossed paths with another girl, this one in cat costume. Another black cat! What was it with these people and their color prejudice? The gray cat hissed, and to her surprise, the girl hissed back. It was not a proper feline hiss, but it got the point across. The cat's tail whipped the air with her anger, and she stood, back arched, until the impersonator retreated and disappeared around a corner.
A pair of boys, small but full of energy, bounced past her, chattering about playing tricks on their classmates. She snickered, a distinctly unpleasant sound. So they liked tricks, did they? She would see about that. She trotted after them, maintaining a discreet distance, until they turned into a room.
It was a classroom, judging by the furniture, but much more interesting than most Mrs. Norris had been in. Shelves filled with jars of things that demanded inspection lined the walls. Later, she promised them. Now she had business to attend to.
In what he probably thought was a soft voice, one of the boys said something about Professor Snape. The cat ignored him and padded over to the teacher's desk. She concealed herself in a dark cranny beneath it. Then in her softest voice, she let out a low moan.
The sounds of activity stopped. "What was that?" asked one of the miscreants. The response was too mumbled for Mrs. Norris to make out.
When the sounds resumed, she called out again, this time a little louder. Again the noises stopped. Not waiting for them to start again, she let out a wail of the kind that her human said sounded like a baby with its foot caught in a trap. She followed it with a truly bloodcurdling scream.
Two young voices cried out with alarm. Two sets of footsteps dashed for the door and faded down the corridor.
Mrs. Norris strutted out, a smirk twitching her whiskers. That was more like it. She might not be a black cat, but she could still be plenty scary.